I’m with Philip Bump. I don’t understand the whole Hunter Biden thing, nor the whole impeaching Joe Biden over vague shit supposedly related to Hunter. And, yet, none of it has to have any kind of logical consistency because simply throwing allegations at the Bidens has the intended impact on their reputations.

But here is what I do know.

We all understand that people who are struggling with addiction make horrible choices and often those choices involve committing crimes. You don’t get to argue that you aren’t responsible for these crimes and in many cases it’s precisely the accountability for criminal behavior that leads addicts into treatment. Yet, we also understand that the best outcome isn’t long jail sentences for non-violent crimes. If someone has sought treatment and remained drug or alcohol free, and they’ve stopped committing new crimes, we often take that into account when it comes time to make charging decisions about things they did while in active addiction. We often see the charges dropped or, if there’s a conviction, we see a lighter or deferred sentence coupled with probation.

In Hunter Biden’s case, he lied about his drug use when buying a gun. He’s being charged with two false statements and also the resulting unlawful possession of the firearm. I’m okay with him paying a price for this. I think he should pay a hefty fine and have some court supervision for a while to make sure he’s staying sober and on the right side of the law. If he’s ever allowed to buy a gun again, it shouldn’t be for quite some time. But I really don’t see any reason why he should go to prison over this.

According to CNN, the U.S. Attorney investigating the matter, David Weiss, actually announced a deal where the “the gun charge would be dropped in two years if Hunter Biden passed regular drug tests and stayed out of legal trouble.” That’s a normal way of dealing with this kind of situation. It’s not overly punitive and it’s not special treatment for a president’s son. Unfortunately, that deal, which also involved Hunter copping to some tax charges, was blown up by a federal judge. Weiss was then promoted to a Special Counsel and now he’s treating the gun charge like a homicide or something. If convicted on all counts, Hunter will face as much as 25 years in prison and fines of up to $750,000. Of course, he won’t get the maximum penalty, but you get the picture.

And yet, as Bump points out, this isn’t making the right happy because they can’t tie Joe Biden to a gun his son owned for 11 days back in 2018. To be honest, the only reason I care about any of this is because it angers me that Joe Biden has to deal with it. I wish he could focus on helping his son recover, because I know what it’s like when they don’t.